Looking Back, This Gen Was Disappointing On The Graphics Side Of Things...

[Jack_Tripper]

Heh. I seem to remember back in the N64 days that they did this a lot with "high res" mode. High res mode of course ran at like 10-15 fps in various games and was often unplayable. What a tease. Some N64 games even have options to adjust texture filtering type to replace the ultra-blur with pixelation.

30 fps is good enough for me. I think the only people that really care about getting more are the competitive multiplayer folks.

Yeah - the only game I remember seeing this ever really "Work" in was Turok 2, and that was only if you had the expansion pack. Remember games that required that thing? Donkey Kong springs to mind

On topic though, I'd be agreeable to solutions that provided High Quality 30fps Single Player experiences and lowered quality 60fps settings. I don't know that you could make it a choice in MP as those with 60fps would have an obvious advantage. I'd love to see this implemented into modern console games...don't think we need to wait for the next generation of hardware to make that happen.

Jack

 

[catisfit]

30 fps is good enough for me. I think the only people that really care about getting more are the competitive multiplayer folks.

...and racing nuts.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

...and racing nuts.

Yeah. Who'd have thought pistachios in fast cars would be so picky?

 

[catisfit]

Yeah. Who'd have thought pistachios in fast cars would be so picky?

 

[fearsomepirate]

While this point is true, it is also true that Wii was (and still is) the only way to get your hands on motion controls. When that changes next year, consumers will have a choice. Two machines will look markedly better and will have the new "buzz" which is already starting to fizzle out of Wii.

Wii's buzz was generated by software, not the controller alone. What arrests the market's attention in 2006 is old news by 2011 or 2012 (or whenever the HD counterattacks get launched). To generate Wii-like buzz, the HD Twins will need games that have both broad appeal and novelty. "Sony Wiggle Sports in HD" won't cut it. Sure, there will be flurries of new threads on neogaf regardless of the software, but that's not the same thing as the kind of buzz that drove Wii Fit to 15 million units sold.

 

[22psi]

I don't agree at all, pretty damn happy with this gen's graphics. Animation is what is disappointing still to this day. And no, all the consoles even Wii is not yet tapped out.

 

[Nesh]

Wii's buzz was generated by software, not the controller alone. What arrests the market's attention in 2006 is old news by 2011 or 2012 (or whenever the HD counterattacks get launched). To generate Wii-like buzz, the HD Twins will need games that have both broad appeal and novelty. "Sony Wiggle Sports in HD" won't cut it. Sure, there will be flurries of new threads on neogaf regardless of the software, but that's not the same thing as the kind of buzz that drove Wii Fit to 15 million units sold.

Why wouldnt it cut it? What is that ingredient that makes Wii appeal in mass?

Take a look at Wii Sports. Its actually "Nintendo Wiggle sports in SD".

 

[TheWretched]

I am also very happy with todays graphics. At least with the games I love (MGS4, Fallout 3 (could use better filtering on PS3), Dead Space, Uncharted, GT5P).

I can see the bad shadowing too, and I'd love to see better ones, but I can live with that. Having seen the progression of Uncharted 1 to Uncharted 2, and Uncharted 1 still being one of the best looking games there is (AND first gen for Naughty Dog), I have no doubt we'll see games that look even better than what we have now.

My pet peeve is more concerning stuff like limited gameplay. I'd love to do just "more" in many games. There were far to few vehicle sections in Killzone 2 for example.

Also, loading times. Some games hide them VERY well (again, Uncharted), but others really suck at it (Rock Band 2 has long loading times for each new song you chose (except setlists). I have no problem with having to install my games, if they have a nice installer (MGS4) or no installer at all (Fallout 3).

But I hope that next gen consoles will have more RAM (generally, I hate it that consoles always have too little RAM) and have mandatory 1080P at 30Hz with some filtering as a TRC. There'll hopefully be now new TV standard by then either.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Why wouldnt it cut it? What is that ingredient that makes Wii appeal in mass?

It was first.

 

[Mobius1aic]

The fact that so many games are rendering below 720p is disappointing, but everything else is just fine. The only other disappointing thing is that the damn consoles are taking away the PC platforms thunder in some ways. Thankfully it's still breaking new ground that'll show up in the next generation of consoles which is probably at least 3 or 4 years off before either Sony or MS decides to create a new console. However I'm expecting Nintendo to release a new system be it a Wii HD or a real successor by fall of 2010 or 2011.

 

[fearsomepirate]

Why wouldnt it cut it?

What is that ingredient that makes Wii appeal in mass?

Novelty. And that's not just for Wii...it's for entertainment in general. Want to know why no new Sci-Fi action pic of the early 80s generate ridiculous levels of fan fanaticism? Star Wars was already out. Why don't any fantasy novels about elves and orcs do anywhere near 50 million sales? Lord of the Rings has already been written. Why didn't any Quake killer kill Quake? Because Quake was already Quake.

This is what constantly flummoxes monkey-see-monkey-do developers. Because they think that success comes from following formulas, they can never understand why their Halo-killers, Mario-killers, GTA-killers, Quake-killers, Starcraft-killers, Counterstrike-killers, and Gran Turismo-killers all get brutally murdered by their targets.

 

[LunchBox]

I think it depends on the person... I know for a fact that a lot of people think that console graphics are better than PC graphics... which is sad... Well, for my friend's situation, he is comparing his PS3 that he plays in his 1080P Plasma TV versus his PC gaming rig (he has a 4870... but his monitor is a super generic, TN panel @ 1920x1200) He is not a tech guy at all. But he swears that his PS3's graphics kick his PC graphic's butt. He usually plays Devil May Cry 4 and Street Fighter 4 on his PC (before that he was a WoW guy). But he just bought the PS3 version of those games and that is where he is basing his opinion on... I do realize that this is a tech site that mainly dissect every technological facet of a hardware (which is why I love coming here ), but to those regular consumers who has no clue to what a polygon or a texture map is... they seem pretty happy about this generation. I work part-time in a game store and I see those type of guys everytime I work.

 

[pjbliverpool]

I think it depends on the person... I know for a fact that a lot of people think that console graphics are better than PC graphics... which is sad... Well, for my friend's situation, he is comparing his PS3 that he plays in his 1080P Plasma TV versus his PC gaming rig (he has a 4870... but his monitor is a super generic, TN panel @ 1920x1200) He is not a tech guy at all. But he swears that his PS3's graphics kick his PC graphic's butt. He usually plays Devil May Cry 4 and Street Fighter 4 on his PC (before that he was a WoW guy). But he just bought the PS3 version of those games and that is where he is basing his opinion on...

Have you pointed out to him that aside from the resolution/MSAA/AF/Framerate, all of which would be better on his PC, the graphics are technically identical between the two platforms in those games?

He's obviously just comparing "the look" of the game on a big screen TV compared with a relatively small monitor. He could always hook his PC up to the TV if he needs proof.

 

[Arwin]

You're missing the point here (which is the fact that he needs this to be pointed out).

 

[pjbliverpool]

You're missing the point here (which is the fact that he needs this to be pointed out).

What I don't understand is why anyone with that attitude would have a 4870 and a 1920x1200 monitor in the first place.

Surely if your going to spend that kind of money, or even have enough knowledge to know what your spending that kind of money on, you should be at least a bit of a PC gaming enthusiast and know a liitle about PC hardware and its capabilties.

I can understand that attitude from console only gamers or console gamers that still use PC's with 6600GT's in them, but the individual above perplexes me!

 

[flipswitch]

Am I reading this right, why does the cell = 200 something gflops, and todays modern cpus are like 50 gflops?

Is the cell several times faster, or have I got it all wrong?

 

[Arwin]

Am I reading this right, why does the cell = 200 something gflops, and todays modern cpus are like 50 gflops?

Is the cell several times faster, or have I got it all wrong?

You've got it all wrong.

Seriously, desktop CPUs GFLOPS are usually double precision. Cell's are single precision, as are GPUs generally. Cell can do double precision, but not very efficiently - it's optimised for single precision. There's a new model of Cell developed by IBM that's optimised for double precision (PowerXCell 8i), achieving around 100 GFLOPS, versus the about 15-20 GFLOPS that the Cell manages in double precision.

That still means though that if you actually only need single precision the Cell and GPUs are a lot faster than modern CPUs (especially GPUs, which can go up to 1200 something gflops in single precision, though still managing a respectable 240 GFLOPS in double precision as well).

 

[Gubbi]

Am I reading this right, why does the cell = 200 something gflops, and todays modern cpus are like 50 gflops?

Is the cell several times faster, or have I got it all wrong?

There's just not a lot of correlation of peak FLOPS and game engine performance.

Cheers

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Am I reading this right, why does the cell = 200 something gflops, and todays modern cpus are like 50 gflops?

Is the cell several times faster...

Yes. . The others have posted caveats, but you miust remember Cell was designed for fast throughput with different workloads. Just having a high maximum possible maths processing power doesn't mean you work faster on real code provided. However, when code is optimised to run top-speed on Cell, it will run faster than on a modern CPU because it has more available maths crunching power (single precision or integers).

 

[LunchBox]

Have you pointed out to him that aside from the resolution/MSAA/AF/Framerate, all of which would be better on his PC, the graphics are technically identical between the two platforms in those games?

He's obviously just comparing "the look" of the game on a big screen TV compared with a relatively small monitor. He could always hook his PC up to the TV if he needs proof.

That's just the thing, he doesn't care much for specs, he just goes by what he sees. I can quote and show him all these numbers but he will just look at me blankly and would just go off thinking the same way he did prior to any of that... Which is really frustrating at times. But it's a sad reality that this type of thinking represent the majority or at least a sizable chunk of consumers out there.